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Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

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Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#271

Post by jki275 »

throwanem wrote: post #154
jki275 wrote: post #150

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You didn't look very hard: https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-truth-about-...

Zubrin's fine, if excessively Golden Age of Science Fiction for my taste, when he talks about Mars. Earth, not so much. But, again, if you want to keep company with someone who's super excited about anthropogenic climate change, likens mosquitoes to Nazi V-2s, and alludes with crafty dissimulation to the conspiracy theory around environmentalism that forms the backbone of such sober documentaries as "Kingsman: The Se…

You can attack the messenger all day, without addressing any of the actual science. Just because you dislike the facts doesn't change that they remain facts.

Silent Spring was a work of fiction, but it killed millions of children in the developing world, and continues to do so to this day. Fortunately at least some have seen the light and relaxed the ban on DDT.

Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#273

Post by nkozyra »

smabie wrote: post #173
nkozyra wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> it wouldn’t actually be a big problem like some say Well this is the law of unintended consequences in action. Many people don't think it will have any negative effect but we don't know. Nature is extraordinarily complex and disrupting it in such a huge way almost always carries knock-on impact.

Saying we are too stupid to ever know anything is a pretty anti-scientific attitude. Maybe global warming is gonna make the world so much better, after all, we don't really know anything. It's impossible to actually live your life if you just throw your hands up and say "we don't know". What we do know is that mosquitos have killed more humans than probably anything else ever . Shouldn't that be impetus enough to act…

> Saying we are too stupid to ever know anything is a pretty anti-scientific attitude.

It's also a straw man. I didn't say we're "too stupid" to "ever know anything." So let's at least engage in good faith.

Should we "do something?" Sure. And we have, for centuries. Did you miss anti malarial drugs, physical detriments and mitigations?

"Advocating against doing anything" is another gross straw man argument.

Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#274

Post by wutbrodo »

grawprog wrote: post #250
bradam wrote: post #231

One of my classmates came back from Africa to Europe this March without any symptoms. 10 days later she got high fever, dizziness, and unfortunately she could not even recognise her family. Everyone thought its COVID, and doctors recommended her to stay home to not spread the "virus". Unfortunately when she got the the hospital, the diagnostics was too late to and she died in malaria 1,5 days later. Please beware of…

Makes you wonder how many people have actually died so far this way. Being told to stay home and not spread covid, meanwhile something else is actually terribly wrong.

The ex-Covid death rate in New York is significantly above its baseline. Part of this may be undiagnosed covid deaths, but with less people out doing dangerous things, a lot of it is probably people avoiding hospitals.

Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#275

Post by epicureanideal »

enchiridion wrote: post #104
seph-reed wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Super down for this. First test it on a small isolated island. I think the main reason people don't like camping or nature is because of mosquitos and biting ants. This dislike of outdoors converts directly to a lack of environmentalism. I don't know the conversion rate, so who knows how much more we'd care for nature minus mosquitos, but if we're destroying the planet either way, we should at least enjoy some part o…

Let's take care of ticks whole we're at it!

Absolutely.

Saber tooth tigers. Check. Dire wolves. Check.

The environment adapted just fine to the loss of these species.

The 1000s of other species made extinct recently... Oops!

...But again, the natural ecosystem didn't irrecoverably collapse.

After eliminating so many much more valuable or interesting species (IMO), I certainly don't want to stop right when we're getting to ticks and mosquitoes.

Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#276

Post by lutorm »

djsumdog wrote: post #266
grawprog wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Makes you wonder how many people have actually died so far this way. Being told to stay home and not spread covid, meanwhile something else is actually terribly wrong.

There was an Oncologist who was talking about how the number of women coming in for regular exams was non-existent for two months. A few months is enough time for breast cancer to go from stage 1 to stage 2, and for 5 year survival rates to drop by a third[0]. There are going to be a ton of secondary effects due to prematurely closing or clearing out hospitals and clinics, and many people have already died from compl…

A few months is enough time for breast cancer to go from stage 1 to stage 2 ...

Do women normally have breast exams every few months?

Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#277

Post by mijowi »

3pt14159 wrote: post #94
yyyk wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is very well studied - Mosquitoes are an invading species in most areas; Only a few subspecies are harmful to humans, and they'll be replaced by similar mosquitoes that aren't. Besides, there's a very wide gap between what the West is and was willing to do when an infectious disease happens. When Malaria hit the West, we drained entire swamps (and their ecosystems) without a second though. When corona hits,…

Destroying every member of a specific species is ridiculous. In the next couple decades we'll solve the majority of the illnesses that these things cause and we can roll out the cures around the world without the permanent damage to these ecosystems. I also lived for a time as a child in Manitoba and my grandfather got live altering malaria, so I don't share any love for these insects but we're part of something bigg…

Honestly solving the illnesses isn’t enough. I don’t want anything drinking my blood.

Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#278

Post by EL_Loco »

teruakohatu wrote: post #270
seppin wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Someone always pops up to save "pitbulls have a bad rep" but they also account for > 80% of all bites and deaths by dog. That's not an accident.

I used to belive that, but I have since come to believe that the explanatory variable in vicious dog attacks are the type of owners, and the breeders who supply those owners, not dog breed. If you banned pitbulls they would just switch to buying and abusing alsatians.

I've been around many alsatians, and many pitbulls (never had one, but many friends have). Given equal training, equal education (or whatever you want to call what some people do to their dogs), most pitbulls will be different from alsatians in temperament. When they are in attack mode, they're much more likely to not let go, and to bite much harder. There's a spectrum among breeds regarding the agressiveness of their attacks, and that's something you can't argue, I think. You can abuse the hell out of Yorkshire Terriers, they just won't be as dangerous as pitbulls.

Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#279

Post by dntbnmpls »

mac01021 wrote: post #27

Just as a curiosity, humans kill hundreds of trillions of insects annually. [1] https://www.quora.com/How-many-insects-die-from-people-stepp...

If you include all human activity - like home building and farming, it's probably in the quadrillions.

Re: Mosquitoes kill more than 700k people every year (2017)

#280

Post by acdha »

bsytko wrote: post #240
dean wrote: post #110

According to the book "The Mosquito: A Human History of Our Deadliest Predator" by Timothy C. Winegard, the mosquito has killed an estimated 52 billion people from a total of 108 billion people that have ever lived. (Not sure how those numbers were determined.)

Curious as to why we haven't evolved tougher skin then. Mosquito resistant skin would appear to be a trait that would allow you to live longer.

Evolution doesn’t care about longevity or quality of life: it’s all about passing genes on. If some kind of mosquito resistance didn’t lead to increasing the number of children you have there’s not going to be much selection pressure for it.
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